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CHAPTER XII.

THE ABBA FATHER.

BARING GOULD has a suggestive chapter on the names of God." "The idea of God," he says, "having been conceived, it became necessary for man to find a name which should express his apprehension of the Deity." The line of his argument excludes reference to the name by which the Christian calls upon God, but it may suggest, what indeed is a matter of consciousness, that our idea of God grows. Memory may not be able to throw much light on the time when, or the manner in which, the idea got root in our being; we may not have been always cognisant of the sunny hours and genial rains which fertilised it; but we know what ripe fruit has fallen from it, and how increasingly defiant of all storms the growth of the idea has become. We must not, of course, hide from our eyes the influences that may hinder or help it, that may chequer and vary its development. The intellectual

and moral forces that play upon us daily are not without their results. There is much to unsettle men in these times, unless they are able, by severe thought and deep conviction, to put down the foot firmly. If some leading names in literature had all the power they aim at, our idea of God would be a very small thing indeed. A big name might be invented. for it, with but little meaning in the name. It is otherwise, however, when our idea of God is allowed to grow under the helping influences which Jesus brings. We reach a fresh stage when we are able to cry "Abba Father."

The expression has gathered round it a considerable amount of discussion, and, as might be expected, a little speculation as well. It is used three times in the New Testament; once by the Saviour and twice by Paul. The underlying elements of thought and feeling are understood, but there is some little difference of opinion on this peculiar mode of expressing them. Why should the Saviour in His prayer in Gethsemane employ two languages in using the name Father? Why should Paul also, when speaking of the free spirit which animates the believer in Jesus, represent him as speaking in two different languages? Why this seeming pleo

nasm, this redundancy of expression? and why, in seeking an equivalent, draw from another language? Is it conformity to the custom of giving to persons a variety of names, such as we have it existing even in our own country? Is the one word simply an explanation or interpretation of the other, such as we often hear public speakers make, when, having used some technical term, they attempt the expression of the thought in terms more simple? Bengel says, Mark added the word "Father" by way of interpretation; but we are not sure that Bengel should attribute to Mark any such deed or design. Lightfoot is somewhat doubtful, and says it may "perhaps be an addition of the Evangelist himself, explaining the Aramaic word after his wont." Stuart says that "Augustine and Calvin think that the design of using both words is to show that both Jews and Greeks, each in their own respective language, would call on God as a Father." But Stuart objects to this, and refers to the Saviour's use of words as putting such an idea out of the question. But what if, as Dr. Morison puts it, "the dual form of the appellation is delightfully fitted to suggest that in His great work He personated in His single self not Jews only, but Gentiles also?"

And not only "fitted," we would add, but designed. And so Paul may have caught the spirit and aim of the Master's words with a firmer and more comprehensive grasp than we are apt to imagine, and Augustine and Calvin may have seen deeper into Paul's reason for imitating his Master than Stuart gives them credit for. And thus in the far-reaching design of both Jesus and Paul, we have, as Lightfoot says, in "this phrase a speaking testimony to that fusion of Jew and Greek which prepared the way for the preaching of the Gospel to the heathen." The idea of Father clasps not the languages only, but the people also. What other word so calculated to consecrate all language and love! What other word so fitted as a basis for all the nations to meet on and be made one! When men in their own language shall intelligently cry "Father," then shall the brighter visions of prophet and poet be realised, and the end for which the Saviour died and the Apostle toiled be gained. Grandly prophetic of that time is the significant expression "Abba Father." But it may mean more; it may illustrate how the idea of Fatherhood evokes the deepest filial feeling. Stier objects to the notion of Grotius that the redoubled cry is a testi

mony of deep feeling. We know not why he should object. In the only three instances in which we have the words, there is everything to justify the opinion that deep feeling is expressed. Unless we simply take the one word as the interpretation of the other, as a mere addition by the writers, it seems we are shut up to the idea of deep feeling responding to the idea of Fatherhood. It is the child-cry coming, not from the surface of the nature, but from its depths. The words are not the expression of reverence merely, or dependence, or deference, but of deep filial affection; and it is to the idea of Fatherhood they respond. How much larger and more tender the word Father is, than the word Master, or Magistrate, or King, or Lord, or Judge. The paternal element touches with rare power the deepest depths of the heart. In the hour of a great sorrow, when the pressure is too much for the springs of life to bear, and when the events of the hour crowd together, and the uncertainty of what is coming next unnerves a man, how blessed it is to be able to say "Father," even if we only meant an earthly father. But when, as Jesus has taught us in His sorrow, we can say Father as He said it, how blessed beyond the power of words must that soul be.